anonymous

4 years ago

Excerpted from “In Reference to her Children” by Anne Bradstreet
I had eight birds hatcht in one nest,
Four wingspans were there, and Hens the rest.
I nurst them up with pain and care,
No cost nor labour did I spare
Till at the last they felt their wing,
Mounted the Trees and learned to sing.
The author's purpose for writing is to
entertain the reader with a description of song birds.
entertain the reader with descriptions of her children.
persuade the reader to not have children.
teach the reader how to take care of children

This rose-bush, by a strange chance, has been kept alive in history; but whether it had merely survived out of the stern old wilderness, so long after the fall of the gigantic pines and oaks that originally overshadowed it,—or whether, as there is fair authority for believing, it had sprung up under the footsteps of the sainted Ann Hutchinson, as she entered the prison-door,—we shall not take upon us to determine. Finding it so directly on the threshold of our narrative, which is now about to issue from that inauspicious portal, we could hardly do otherwise than pluck one of its flowers and present it to the reader. It may serve, let us hope, to symbolize some sweet moral blossom, that may be found along the track, or relieve the darkening close of a tale of human frailty and sorrow.

(Excerpt from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne)
The theme of punishment because of morality reflects the
author's love of crime and punishment.
belief that crimes should not be punished.
time period the literature came from.
time period the reader accesses the piece.